Tropical Storm Nicole continues to gain steam in the Atlantic Ocean, just north of the Bahamas. Sustained winds are just shy of hurricane status at 70 mph as it moves toward Florida's eastern seaboard.
A Hurricane Warning is in effect for parts of Florida with a Tropical Storm Warning stretching along the Georgia coast to just north of Charleston, SC.
Florida counties included in the Hurricane Warning are: Volusia, Brevard, Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin, and Palm Beach. Cities included are Daytona Beach, New Smyrna Beach, Titusville, Port Saint John, Rockledge, Satellite Beach, Melbourne, Palm Bay, Sebastian, Vero Beach, Fort Pierce, Port St. Lucie, Palm City, Jupiter, and West Palm Beach.
Orlando, Fort Myers, Tampa, Jacksonville, and Tallahassee are all included in a Tropical Storm Warning.
The forecast cone from the National Hurricane Center shows the center of the storm reemerging over the Gulf of Mexico as it makes a turn to the northeast along an approaching cold front. This would bring the center right over central Georgia.
Rain will begin as soon as Thursday afternoon, becoming steadier in the evening and the overnight hours.
Much of our area is expected to be "dirty side" of the storm. That right side of a tropical system may contain gusty to damaging winds and brief, spin-up tornadoes.
Anywhere northeast of the center of Nicole will have the threat for tropical tornadoes, which are typically weak in nature.
Everyone in Central Georgia will feel the wind beginning today. The combination of a high pressure system to our north and Nicole to our south is creating wind gusts upward of 30 mph.
As the rain approaches, the gusts could be as high as 40 mph from Thursday afternoon into Friday morning.
All of the impacts from Nicole should be gone by late Friday or early Saturday as a big cold front pushes the storm out to sea. As always, keep up with 13WMAZ on air and online for more tropical updates.
